North Testifies He Felt Like Chess Pawn, Admits Lying

WASHINGTON —  Oliver North conceded Friday that he lied to congressmen who came to the White House to question him about the Contras, but he said he did not think it was unlawful because the things he was hiding, “I was told, could not, should not be revealed.”

“I felt like a pawn in a chess game being played by giants,” he testified.

The courtroom was packed and long lines formed in the hallway outside as the former National Security Council aide spent his second day in the witness chair, undergoing gentle examination by his lawyer, Brendan Sullivan.

At the White House, meanwhile, President Bush, citing concern about “endangering the trial,” refused to answer questions about his own role in aiding the Contras, as disclosed in a lengthy “admission of facts” introduced by North’s lawyers on Thursday.

Flew to Honduras

The court statement, agreed to by both the government and North’s lawyers, said Bush got several North memorandums regarding the secret operation to aid the Contras and also flew to Honduras to tell that nation’s president of expedited U.S. aid--which was aimed at inducing Honduras to help the Nicaraguan Contras as well.

In court Friday, the jury was read a “Dear Ollie” note that Bush, then vice president, sent North at Thanksgiving in 1985.

“One of the many things I have to be thankful for is the way in which you have performed under fire in tough situations,” said the note, written on the back of a picture. “Your dedication to the hostage thing and Central America gives me cause for great pride.”

On the witness stand, North testified that to fend off the possibility of a broader congressional inquiry, he agreed to meet with the House Intelligence Committee in the White House on August, 1986.

Felony Charges

The 12 felony charges against him include obstructing Congress in saying that he did not give military advice to the Contras and did not raise money for them.

“Did you tell the truth at that meeting on Aug. 6, 1986?” Sullivan asked.

“No,” North answered.

“Do you believe your conduct was unlawful?”

“No, I didn’t think that it was unlawful. . . . “

“I was put in a situation, having been raised to know what the Ten Commandments are and knowing it would be wrong to do that, but I went into the meeting not believing it would be illegal not to tell Congress the truth. And that’s why I didn’t think the meeting would be a good idea.”

Poindexter Told?

Did North tell all that to Adm. John Poindexter, who was the President’s national security adviser and North’s boss?

“Yes.”

“And what was his position?”

“You can take care of it.”

Poindexter, North said, was worried that a $100-million Contra aid package that was about to be approved by Congress would be imperiled if the Administration refused to respond to Congress.

“I told him the heart of the (congressional) resolution of inquiry was about all kinds of things that couldn’t be addressed and he and I both knew what they were,” North testified, an apparent reference to secret White House efforts to help the Contras at a time when Congress had banned official U.S. aid.

“These things I had done, I was told could not, should not be revealed.”

North said he wanted the Reagan White House to invoke executive privilege and refuse to answer any questions, but was brushed aside by his boss.

‘More Difficult’

“You start howling about executive privilege and it’s just going to make it more difficult for everybody,” North said Poindexter told him.

North also testified Friday that he complained that a key letter sent to Capitol Hill by Robert McFarlane, Poindexter’s predecessor as national security adviser, was “totally inconsistent” with the facts and “all this was going to do was add fuel to the fire.” North said, “The answer he wanted to give was wrong; it was not factual.”

That letter forms the basis of one of the charges. Prosecutors charge that North drafted it, although it was signed by McFarlane.

North also contradicted McFarlane by testifying that he altered classified memos at McFarlane’s direction.

‘At His Direction’

The memos showed “what I had been doing at his direction in Central America” for the Contras, “the delivery of arms, working with General Secord and . . . building the resistance,” North told the jury.

Richard Secord, a former major general, was enlisted by North to run arms to the Contras.

McFarlane, however, had testified at the trial that North came to him unsolicited with a few proposed changes, but that McFarlane threw them away.

North said he had balked at making the changes when McFarlane first asked in 1985.

But in November, 1986, as the Iran-Contra affair was surfacing, McFarlane, by then out of the National Security Council but having returned to help reconstruct an account of the Iran arms initiative, again asked North about the memos.

Altered Documents

“I haven’t taken care of it yet, but I will,” North said he told McFarlane. North’s former secretary, Fawn Hall, testified earlier that, on instructions from North, she altered the documents by deleting numerous references to North’s direct involvement with the Contras.

“It never occurred to me it was unlawful,” North said.

On another point, North said there was wide dissemination to top Administration officials of sensitive intelligence about the North-arranged delivery of missiles from Israel to Iran at the time it took place. One of the charges against North is that he prepared a chronology in November, 1986, denying that anyone in the government knew in 1985 that what was labeled “oil drilling equipment” actually was missiles.

North, who testified nearly five hours and will return on Monday, also was asked by Sullivan about a $13,800 security fence built around his house and paid for by Secord--also the basis of a criminal charge.

“Did you intend to violate the law?” Sullivan asked.

“No, I intended to pay for it.”

“Did you ever pay for it?”

“No, I did not,” North said.